Кэрол Дуглас - Cat In A Crimson Haze

"There wasn't much of a music selection in seminary," Matt said dryly, stepping into the elevator with Temple, tote bag and all.

Not until she had produced her keys and was borne to her living-room sofa did Temple feel like someone who could stand on her own two feet again, even though she sat.

Something had changed in the weeks since she was attacked by thugs desperately seeking information about Max. Maybe the change had come since she had arranged her ersatz prom night with Matt. The remote hope of intimacy between them had become less remote and less of a hope than a . . . threat. They had a fledgling relationship now: anything that pushed it into a new configuration could be as much loss as gain.

She felt clumsy again, and awkward, and as if even that were her fault.

"Guilt," Matt said, taking the word out of her mind if not her mouth.

"What?"

"Guilt makes people apologize for something negative happening to them. It's a bad habit." He vanished into the kitchen. Temple heard him wrestling ice cubes from the dang plastic twist-trays that she could do nothing with . . . except break fingernails on them. She winced at the wrenching squeak when the cold little devils popped from their plastic condominiums into the warm, cruel world where they would shortly melt into oblivion.

Matt had no such problems over empathizing with ice cubes. Her ankle was soon collared in a damp towel lumpy with ice.

Matt moved a pile of newspapers on the oversized ottoman and sat in the vacancy.

''How are you feeling, really?" he asked.

Temple's head wagged from side to side in the gesture that meant "so-so." She suspected that her congealing bruises were beyond counting, but she had sustained no major hurt. Her ankle's aching and burning had eased already. Her pride was still in a touchy, tender state, though.

"Electra will spend the evening with you," Matt said. "This is my shift. What can I do?"

"Nothing for a while. I just want to sit and think about it."

"The accident?"

"The maybe-accident. Nicky seemed pretty serious."

"Who's his Uncle Mario?"

"I was afraid you'd ask. I'm afraid that I know: 'Macho Mario' Fontana. Once upon a time, when the mob still ran this town, Macho Mario was a big wheel over all the little crime cogs in this town."

"And you work for his nephew?"

"Nicky's the white sheep of the family, honest. With the Gaming Commission eyeing every transaction, nobody in Las Vegas could get away with crime connections now."

"I see. So elves murdered my stepfather."

"I'm talking about organized crime, not the usual freelance round of lust, larceny and murder. Las Vegas's dicey reputation gave it a kind of hard-edged glamour in the old days.

Poking fun at it is like teasing a paper tiger nowadays. Heck, even my Gridiron skit plays on all the paranoid conspiracy theories that grew up around this town. I created a secret stash of mob money under the new Scarab theme hotel, affectionately known as 'the Scab' only the underground area is also a clandestine government nuclear testing site, where they've hidden all the aliens that landed at Nellis Air Force Base, and there are thousands of those. It's a send-up of the excessive, spooky stuff that gets said about this city."

''Sounds weird enough to dazzle even Las Vegans."

"You should see the set they're gonna do! Danny Dove was showing me the plans just before I made like Jill-up-a-hill. So spectacularly garish--that isn't easy to achieve in this town."

"And here you were worried because your arch-rival Crawford Buchanan was show chairman. Sounds like it turned out okay."

"Okay ... as long as I don't see much of Crawford. And as long as he doesn't mess with my production number. Oh, and they persuaded Johnny Diamond to sing my Las Vegas Follies medley; he is such a powerhouse! Listen, can you go to the Gridiron? I mean, with me?"

"My investigations have reached a dead end, so I suppose I can get the night off if I ask in advance." Matt paused to pick up a section of the Las Vegas Sun . "Sure. Will Lieutenant Molina be doing a solo too?"

Temple's good mood plummeted. "Only around the Crystal Phoenix crime scene."

She leaned forward to adjust the towel on her ankle. Matt leaped up to help, ruining her attempt to buy time while she decided whether or not to tell him something personal.

Before Temple could lean back, he had stuffed a couple of supporting pillows behind her.

Solicitation made her nervous. Anything that made her feel helpless did.

"One thing my tumble taught me," she began.

He waited, unaware that this was not what she was going to say originally.

"I think I'm less afraid of being hurt. Not that I'm getting masochistic, but since I've been attempting martial arts, I see myself as less fragile. I know I can get hurt and that I'll heal."

"That's good. If you feel durable, you'll act that way. When it shows, people are less liable to mess with you. And if they do, you're more resilient. That's the trouble with our sexist society: women are so afraid of getting hurt that they let their lives be scribed by that fear."

"Men don't?"

''Maybe men don't let on. That's what we're supposed to learn in team sports: how to get hurt. . . and go on . . . and not let on. Men fear getting hurt in other, less tangible ways."

Temple nodded. ''So do women. Your stepfather's murder--"

Matt kept still, even when Midnight Louie leaped atop the newspapers covering half of the huge ottoman. After some comfy pawing and paper-crackling, his big black paws tucked into each other. Temple was reminded of a mandarin innocently slipping his long-nailed hands inside his robe sleeves for warmth and security. Now Midnight Louie was listening, too. Temple hated broaching a mutual sore spot in public, but she had to do it.

"Molina's on the case now."

"I thought you said it was some other homicide lieutenant."

"It was. It is. But Molina's got an open file that ties into the Effinger death. That file just happens to involve Max's disappearance."

Matt's listening posture stiffened. In a way. Temple was glad that mention of Max Kinsella made him as nervous as talk of his late and definitely unlamented stepfather. Maybe it substantiated his innocence.

Temple finally plunged in where Molina would never fear to tread.

"A man was found dead above the Goliath Hotel gaming area the same night that Max disappeared. The corpse, which was never identified, was wedged into a cubby-hole fashioned from the air-conditioning duct. Molina figures an ace magician would be a natural to set up that spy-hole."

"Why?"

"Who knows? Not me. Not Molina. But, coupling the man's sudden death with Max going AWOL that night, Molina is convinced that something was rotten at the Goliath . . . besides the body odor in the air-conditioning duct.''

"Do you think Max is capable of shady dealing . . . even of murder?"

"No. But I didn't know then what I know now."

''What?" His eyes met hers for the first time since she'd brought up his stepfather's death.

Temple squirmed on the sofa. At least Matt stayed put now, instead of jumping up at her every move.

She bit her lip. ''Molina found an old record on Max. Nothing much, an Interpol file. Max was still a teenager then, but he was suspected of IRA involvement."

"Figures," Matt said promptly. "Kinsella's an Irish name. Tons of Roman Catholics are Irish, and more than a few succumb to backing the IRA."

"Don't you think I'd know if I were living with an international terrorist?"

"Don't get agitated; you'll hurt your foot."

"Forget my foot! Just figure the likelihood that Max was some sort of undercover agent."

"Didn't he travel a lot?"

"Magicians do. They have to go places to perform."

"Out of the country?"